The Internal Revenue Service has experienced a terrible run in recent weeks.

For taxpayers who’ve been at the wrong end of IRS scrutiny, it looks as if karma is making an overdue visit to the tax-collection service. But the disclosure that the IRS may be paying out $70 million in bonuses at a time when the federal budget is being cut revealed more than just an embarrassing political mistake.

The possible disbursement of bonuses indicates that the IRS may feel it is above even presidential and congressional directives on pay and budget cuts. The public and Congress do not see it that way, especially given recent events.

In the last few months, the federal agency has also been exposed as applying political pressure against conservative-leaning and tea party organizations seeking tax-exempt status from 2010 through 2012. And the IRS was recently forced to apologize for wasting taxpayer money on expensive employee conferences and cheesy training videos, including a “Star Trek” spoof that cost at least $50,000.

Something certainly seems amiss at the IRS. Congressional and federal investigators need to keep digging to expose any other mismanagement within the IRS. The agency is too large and too important to be so mismanaged.

The latest woe of the IRS began when U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, disclosed the agency had intentions to pay out $70 million in bonuses to unionized employees. The IRS had initially said it would cancel about $75 million in such upcoming bonuses because of a presidential directive on federal pay, according to Fox News.

The White House is trying to comply with sequestration, the automatic budget cuts that took place on March 1. The cuts will exceed $1 trillion to many defense and non-defense programs over a decade.

But Grassley said the IRS eventually negotiated a $70 million bonus package for members of the National Treasury Employees Union. Grassley believes the bonuses can be legally cancelled.

The news of the bonuses comes at a time when budget cuts are forcing the IRS to furlough, or temporarily lay off, its 90,000 employees for five days. Employees would not be paid for these five days. Yet how much will this save the federal government if many of the employees are getting bonuses?

Also irritating congressional watchdogs is the recent disclosure that the IRS spent about $49 million on lavish training conferences for employees.

The bonus news, the conference controversy and, of course, the disclosure that the IRS was dragging its feet on tea party applications for tax exempt status paint a picture of an agency that is out of control.

For years, the federal government and its salaries grew at a rate disproportionate to the economy. Now the sequester has slowed down that growth.

The IRS and its unions need to be put on notice that they must share in the sacrifice along with other agencies, which include the Pentagon. And given the $70 million in possible bonuses, the IRS has plenty of areas ripe for some cuts.